My Three Suns
My Three Suns is the seventh episode of Futurama Season One. It was written by J. Stewart Burns, and co-directed by Jeffrey Lynch and Kevin O'Brien. Synopsis Hermes Conrad threatens to cut Bender's salary, since Bender has no official duties at Planet Express except sitting on the couch watching the cooking shows all day, something he wanted to keep to himself. Inspired by the Neptunian TV chef Elzar, Bender decides to take on the job as the ship's cook. He, Fry and Leela go to shop for ingredients in Little Neptune. While Bender is buying a Neptunian slug, Fry tries to get his lungs replaced with gills by an organ seller. Just as the seller was about to do unsafe surgery, Leela interrupts the transaction, knocking out the dealer and his crony. She berates Fry afterward for his reckless behavior. Professor Farnsworth then sends the crew off on a delivery to the planet Trisol, a mysterious world in the depths of the Forbidden Zone in the Galaxy of Terror. Leela claims that the scary names are a false conception of the galaxy. Bender serves the crew a meal of almost completely of salty Neptune slug and salted water. After the ship lands, Fry is assigned the task of making the delivery trek across the desert under the planet's three blazing suns. When he arrives at his destination, the Trisolian palace, he finds it empty. Stricken with thirst, he grabs a bottle of blue liquid that is sitting on the throne and drinks it. Armed Trisolians, who are revealed to be liquid-based organisms, storm the throne room, revealing that the bottle Fry drank actually contained the emperor Bont the Viscous. Rather than being punished, Fry is declared the new emperor. Shortly afterward, he opens the package that he was delivering, to reveal a "Please don't drink the Emperor" sign. Ironically, Fry declares that the package arrived just in time. After being found by the crew, Fry chooses Bender as his new prime minister. The high priest Merg informs Fry that as part of the coronation, Fry will have to recite the royal oath which consists mainly of a very, very long list of emperors, in the order that they killed each other from memory, on pain of death if he makes a mistake. During the pre-coronation party, Leela informs Fry that the average reign of a Trisolian emperor is only one week, as whoever "drinks" the old emperor is declared the new one. When Fry refuses to listen to her warning, Leela returns to the ship, vowing not to help Fry again. Fry, apparently aware he cannot be drunk because he is solid, ignores this. At the coronation, Fry recites the oath properly, and is sworn in as Fry the Solid. As the suns set, the Trisolians begin to glow - including the alive-and-well emperor Bont from inside Fry's stomach. Bont demands that Fry be cut open and drained. The crew takes refuge in the throne room, and tries to work out a way to extract the emperor without killing Fry. Bender calls Leela on Fry's behalf, but gets an inconclusive response. She has to fight her way past Trisolian forces in order to reach the palace. Bender sees what is happening and decides to exploit the situation: He lies to Fry by saying that Leela is dead. This prevarication saddens Fry so profoundly that he begins sobbing, though slowly. After Leela arrives, she begins beating Fry, causing him to weep in pain, extracting the emperor. Once he is out, the emperor beats Fry up, taking turns with the other crew members, and thanks him. With the emperor safely outside Fry's body, the crew is allowed to leave. Memorable quotes Fry to Leela: "It's just like the story of the grasshopper and the octopus. All year long the grasshopper kept burying acorns for winter while the octopus mooched off his girlfriend and watched TV. Then the winter came, and the grasshopper died, and the octopus ate all his acorns and also he got a race car. Is any of this getting through to you?" Trivia *The title is a reference to the 1960s sitcom My Three Sons. *The "Essence of Elzar" television show and the Elzar character parody the 20th century "Essence of Emeril" and its host chef. *As Bender goes through the robot wash the song Car Wash by Rose Royce plays; Bender sings his own version. *"Head Shop", slang for a shop where drug paraphernalia for potheads is sold; In/on Little Neptune, the "Head Shop" sells human heads. *Bender cooks wearing a chef's apron bearing the bold text "TO SERVE MAN". This is a reference to a The Twilight Zone episode based on the short story by Damon Knight, both with that title. In that story, the large book carried by giant aliens promising a bright future for Earth and its inhabitants turns out to be a cookbook; the premise of this pun is the same as the Moebius underground comic strip Is Man Good?. *The Galaxy of Terror is a reference to a low-budget 1981 sci-fi movie; the "Forbidden Zone" and an area in the Planet of the Apes movies. *In the Little Neptune Market, when Bender is looking through the shop glass, there's a parody of the "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" advertisements which reads "I Can't Believe It's Not Slug". *One of Bender's prime minister's sash medals features an image of Homer Simpson. Also, there is a badge with a "Arm and Hammer" style emblem, which is an arm with a rolling pin, stating that he is/was the ships chef. *This was the first episode to be rated TV-14. Debut Appearances Characters *Bont *Crack Addict *Elzar *Florp *Gorgak *Merg Gadgets & Inventions *Robot Wash *Genetically enhanced eggplant with yolks *Fish gill implants Alienese *One of the "Do Not Drink the Emperor" signs is in Alienese My Three Suns Category:Articles in need of a re-write